Who Am I?
by Soul of a Wolf
Summary: Raven takes some time to reevaluate who she is, with some unexpected help.
1. Opening Your Eyes

Hello all! It's been a long while since I've written, mainly because college just didn't allow for that sort of thing for me. Hopefully, though, I'll be able to put a couple things up every now and then.

Here's the beginning of a cathartic little piece for me. I hope to have the rest up within the next few days. Enjoy!

- J

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It was a calm evening in Jump City. The sun was well into its westward journey across the fall sky as the sounds of traffic slowly tailed off at the end of rush hour. Children halted their park time play to answer parents calls for dinner. Everyone was ready for a peaceful evening, an occurrence guaranteed by the inhabitants of the uniquely shaped tower just off the bay.

The Titans' Tower, which suddenly spit a small, green body off of its rooftop in a blast of black energy, while another form flew in the opposite direction toward the bay park.

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"You know, BB, your health might benefit from learning when to stop," Cyborg commented disinterestedly, eyes never leaving the TV screen as Beast Boy entered the common room, sopping wet from his quick fall into the ocean.

"How'd you know it was me?" Beast Boy muttered, dripping a trail over to the dining table. Cyborg spared him an amused chuckle.

"I saw you on the way down, bro. That, and thermosensors read the incoming body heat as much lower than normal, which matches that temperature of someone who just had a can-o-whoop opened up on him and was tossed into the ocean."

"You suck, dude," he responded, quickly turning into a large, fluffy St. Bernard before shaking himself, spraying Cyborg with a fair share of the salty water he'd brought it.

"Argh! Dawg, can't you do that in a bathroom or somethin'?" The only response he got was what must have amounted to a cocky grin on the damp dog's face, complete with lolling tongue and wagging tail. "You'd better git before I shave your nasty green hide." Beast Boy merely stood a while longer, seeming to laugh. When Cyborg started to move however, he calmly turned and trotted out of the common room. Cyborg grumbled to himself before returning his attention to the tech program that he'd been watching.

Beast Boy, returning to his normal form, lost the playful expression as he entered his room. Flopping onto his bed with an aggrieved sigh, he started tossing a tennis ball up into the air, catching it, tossing it, catching it…

"Why can't she just let me in?" he asked no one in particular, keeping up his repetitive motions. "Trigon's gone, she's all whole and whatever, you'd think she'd cut me some slack and just…gah!" he grunted. In his building frustration, he'd been throwing the ball harder and harder until, hitting the ceiling, it bounced down faster than he'd counted on, landing on his forehead.

"Good thing I got rid of the stupid bunk," he mumbled as he rubbed his forehead, looking for something else to keep him focused. Realizing nothing short of cleaning his room would yield anything useful to him, opened up his window and hopped out, taking flight as a simple barn swallow.

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"Stupid, annoying, thick-headed, insolent," Raven growled, a continuing string of less than happy adjectives as she landed gently on a grassy cliff overlooking the bay. "Why can't he just let me be?" She turned, looking out at the horizon as the sun neared it, beginning to paint the cloud-speckled sky with a variety of colors.

"Why does he keep trying?" she asked no one in particular as she took up her meditation pose. She began to hover, but didn't begin chanting. Her eyes, however, took on a glossy quality as she simply watched the changing sky, the silence of the evening being relaxant enough for her frazzled nerves.

_He's just wasting his time,_ she thought to herself, relaxing, her muscles loosening as her heartbeat slowed. _Sure, I may no longer be constantly fighting Trigon's demonic influence…but that doesn't change who I am. _Her face slowly drooped, expression becoming evident despite her fixed gaze on the slowly setting sun. _I'm not worth his effort, or anyone else's. There's nothing there to find…so why does he keep digging? My original purpose is no more, thank Azar. My purpose now is…_

_My purpose…is…_

"Penny for your thoughts?"

Raven's eyes shot open, her pulse instantly picking up as she was sure that even here, Beast Boy had managed to disrupt her quiet reflection. Turning her head quickly, near-rage evident on her face, she opened her mouth to rebuke her persistent teammate.

Who had either suddenly turned into a woman with a slightly dark yet normal complexion, or wasn't actually there. Alert now, more than angry, Raven warily eyed the stranger who had not turn to look at her despite speaking.

"Can I help you with something?" The young woman shrugged.

"Just curious. This is my normal meditation spot, and I don't often run into many others here."

Raven blushed, the irony of suddenly becoming the intruder on someone _else's_ meditation crashing down on her. She unfolded her legs, floating down gracefully onto her feet.

"My apologies. I'll be going then," she said sincerely, turning to leave.

"Oh I don't mind," the woman responded. Raven stopped, turning to look back at the girl who had yet to take her eyes off the ocean. "It just caught me off guard, that's all. It's a bit of a challenge getting to this spot the…conventional, way. That's why not many others get here."

"How then, pray tell, do you manage?" Raven asked, returning to her spot next to the woman, shifting her gaze back to the horizon. It may have been a bit prideful, but unique as she was and intelligent as the woman seemed, Raven figured she had easily known her identity as well as her own method of reaching this outlook. The woman chuckled in an amused fashion.

"An earthquake a few years back partially separated this portion of the park from the main grounds. There's a sort of path of random stand-alone platforms that crosses the twenty-some-foot gorge that was created as a result. It's rather precarious and near invisible the darker it gets. The more gutsy teens and thrill-seekers cross in the daylight, but no one dares stay this side long if it's close to sunset."

"Then I assume you either have some sort of light source as well as a limited amount of common sense, or a death wish," Raven responded, her monotone somehow still conveying a sense of incredulity and the woman's somewhat brazen attitude. She had, in fact, seen the gorge before; one misstep meant serious injury at the very least. To her surprise, the woman simply laughed softly.

"A little of both, actually." Raven broke, turning toward her in slight shock. "Never met anyone who was seriously looking to die before?"

"Can't say that I have, no," she answered, her monotone shifting a little at being caught in honest, flat-footed shock. "Most human beings seem to have an inborn instinct to avoid injury and death at all costs."

"A testament to the animal in all of us, yes," the woman responded calmly, still watching the horizon. Her eyes occasionally scanned the skyline as colors seemed to explode up from the ocean, pinks and purples seeping across the sky, but it was the only movement short of those required for speaking she was making. "I guess you might call me more of an animal with a human nature than a human with an animal nature."

"Are you saying humans are not inherently afraid of death?" Raven questioned as she studied the sky once more, truly enjoying the intellectual discussion. It wasn't her first choice of distraction, but proved to be a pleasant alternative.

"In a way. Rarely will you find an animal willing to sacrifice itself for another of its kind, unless there is some bond of value between the two. Mates, mother and offspring, in some species father and offspring…rarely is there ever a case of altruistic sacrifice in the animal world. Altruism is something only humans can accomplish."

"Animals have been known to sacrifice themselves to save their owners," Raven countered.

"True," her philosopher friend replied, "but they've established a bond. That, and it's a trained response of sorts. Humans…humans are a different breed all together. Firemen, police, military, they all willingly risk their lives for others."

"But a dog can be trained to retrieve a person from a collapsing building. Who's to say that their responses aren't simply trained as well?"

"They are, I won't deny that. But unlike a dog, people choose those careers. They decide they are willing to enter a lifestyle that places their own lives at risk. Animals don't do that."

They stood in silence for a while as the sun sank lower, Raven digesting the conversation as she let the peace of the evening once again settle her soul, this time in a new and unexpected fashion.

"Myself, I can't say I classify myself as entirely human," the girl stated softly, breaking the silence moments before Raven herself was about to.

"I can empathize with that," Raven responded in somewhat light-hearted self-deprecation. The woman smiled.

"Yes, I'm sure you can," she answered knowingly, leaving Raven with no doubt that the woman did indeed know of her demonic half. "However, I see you as more human than I see myself." Raven tilted her head slightly, though kept her gaze on the half-set sun.

"How so?"

"You have a purpose."

Raven felt her organs plummit to her feet, an unease settling on her suddenly. "Do I, now?" she whispered, her head and gaze sinking downward.

"Ah, so that's what brought you out here," the woman whispered as Raven had. Raven turned her head, noticing the intense gaze that was suddenly focused on her. "That's why you had that lost look in your eyes. You can't see your purpose."

Raven found herself drawn in. Her defensive instinct screamed for her to look away, to verbally guard against this woman who seemed to be intimately examining her very soul with those warm, chocolate eyes. But there was something about her that made defending against her seem as ridiculous as defending against a newborn kitten. Somehow, there was simply nothing to fear.

"I suppose you can?" was all she responded, intending to sound a little bitter, if not cynical. She winced, though, at the thread of hope that was apparent in the question. The woman smiled sadly.

"I can see a very obvious one, the one that most everyone in the city sees in you and the rest of the Titans. But you're searching for something a little deeper than that, aren't you?" Raven looked away again, but still had her eyes lowered.

"My purpose…was originally pretty horrible. It wasn't something I chose, but it was what I was born for. But now that that's been overcome, now that I'm free of my father…" she trailed off, finding herself back in the spot of thinking she had been in when her guest arrived. "I can't see what there possibly is about me that would mark a need for my continued existence. Yes, I'm a Titan, but so are the others. They are perfectly capable of carrying on without me. I'm in no way like a normal human being; I don't 'have fun,' I don't hang out, I don't…I just…don't fit, anywhere. How could the world possibly need something that doesn't fit?"

Silence settled once more as the woman appeared to digest this new load of information, her gaze never leaving Raven's face. Raven, closing her eyes, simply stood, feeling empty. The tension of carrying such thoughts had left her, but no resolution had taken its place. She listened to the waters below crash diligently against the cliff face, each wave rushing to its end. Was that all she was doing now? Moving along until she hit a blank, nameless end that would effortlessly end her existence? Where was the point in that?

"What does every human want, Raven?" Raven automatically looked up in response to her name, used for the first time this entire conversation. The woman was looking out over the horizon now, the sun finally below the ocean's edge. "There is one common thread throughout all humanity, one thing that every person strives more, no matter how conventional, clichè, twisted or unique a way they do it in. Why do people want money? Why do people turn to alcohol or drugs? Why do they become addicted to sex or pornography, or work, or chocolate? Why do groups of people kill while others save? Why do some give and some take away?" When it became clear that the woman was not going to provide the answer, Raven allowed her brain to hop on to the train of logic the woman had launched.

"They seek happiness," she finally answered after several moments' consideration. The woman nodded, which for some reason brought Raven a faint feeling of pride and accomplishment.

"They seek happiness," the woman repeated. "They pursue whatever they think will make them happy. Happiness is the core purpose of every human being."

"That seems a little selfish," Raven responded skeptically.

"Depends on your point of view. Like I said, people go after what they _think_ will make them happy. When they receive a temporary feeling of power, or fleeting euphoria, or comfort and luxury, they think they are happy. I'm not one for looking to pop culture for great, riveting inspiration, but I believe Morgan Freeman says it quite well in Bruce Almighty: 'Since when do people ever know what they really want?'"

"That's not the most encouraging sentiment." A tired frustration was evident in Raven's voice.

"I know. Trust me, I know. But if there's one thing I've learned about searching for happiness, it comes down to the simplest, most clichè, most difficult and profound truth. Being happy comes with simply being yourself. Your _true_ self, the best that you can. That's everyone's key purpose. Being what they were created to be." Raven's right eyebrow arched high, her open-mindedness starting to take a hike.

"In case we've forgotten, I was created to open up an inter-dimensional portal to allow for the complete domination of Earth." The woman laughed again.

"Oh Raven…have you ever considered that maybe what your father and even your people taught you your purpose was may not have been your actual purpose, but instead an obstacle to overcome in pursuit of your real purpose?" Raven's eyes widened yet again. Soon they were captured yet again by the woman's crystal clear gaze. "Your time with the Titans has given you four people who see things in you that you were never allowed to see in yourself. Did you ever think that maybe, just maybe, these people were given to you to help you be the best Raven you could be? Ridding yourself of Trigon wasn't a way of avoiding your _supposed_ purpose. It was a way of moving closer to your real purpose."

"I…I…never," she stuttered uncharacteristically, her eyes darting around frantically as if clarity would pop up from the grass beneath her feet and settle the storm of thoughts raging in her brain. Eventually, her eyes returned to the safe, steady haven of her impromptu teacher's gaze, and for the first time she studied the woman before her.

She couldn't be much older than Raven herself, maybe mid-twenties at the oldest. Her face was shaped by smooth planes, lean and healthy, much like the rest of her build. There was a motherly softness that offset the obvious strength lying within the easily visible muscles of her arms, left exposed by the loose-fit tank top tucked into equally relaxed-fit jeans. Long, dark brown hair gather in a tight braid draped over her left shoulder, reaching midway down her bicep. She very readily could've passed as a fighter, even a threat to Raven, were it not for the aura of serenity that seemed to permeate her very being.

"Who _are _you?" Raven finally asked, completely forgetting the intial shock of the woman's original statement. The woman simply smiled, leaving Raven feeling more comfortable than she ever had before.

"That should be the question you ask yourself, yes," the woman gently dodged. It was enough, though. Raven launched into a moment of introspection, a quaint look of determination and confusion painting her features. "Let the others help you, Raven. They see things you can't, but there are things only you can discover. You have to know who you are before you know what can make you happy." With that, she pointedly looked up into the branches of the tree behind them, though Raven was too deep in thought to notice. There was a sudden rustling of leaves, as if an animal were startled, though no other motion accompanied it.

"Why does he keep digging?" Raven quietly asked herself again.

"Beg your pardon?" Raven looked up, forgetting about her cliff-partner.

"Just…thinking. You have many wise words for someone so young."

"Several would say the same of you, my friend." They both smiled. Raven looked up, noticing for the first time that several stars were already dotting the sky.

"I guess it's time to be going," she spoke softly, a new beauty descending upon them now that the sun's light was a mere splashing of violet on the horizon. The woman nodded in reply.

"It surely is. I've enjoyed our time together, Raven. I pray your search bears great fruit, which I'm sure it will." Raven looked back at her companion.

"Are you religious?" she asked, suddenly realizing she knew absolutely nothing about this person, and overcome with a desire to know something, _anything_, to remember her by.

"You could say that, yes," she answered wistfully, looking up again into the tree. "S'one of the only things keeping me going. You see, I'm searching for purpose, too." Raven was taken by the sudden sadness in her voice. She was about to speak further when a bird exploded from the branches in a flurry of leaves and feathers. They both watched it take off over the bay. The woman squinted briefly before speaking again. "Was that swallow green?" Raven's eyes suddenly narrowed.

"Beast Boy," she muttered, preparing to chase down her friend who seemed to have no concept of privacy. As she reflexively launched herself into flight, she paused, hovering over the ocean a few feet from the cliff's edge. Turning she looked back at the woman, who was standing relaxed, an amused expression on her face.

"Will I see you again?" Raven asked. "I…this was…I enjoyed our talk," she spat out, flushing slightly at her inability to find words to express herself.

"We'll see what time brings. Go, before Beast Boy thinks he's gotten off scot-free." A spark of…was that mischief?…lit in Raven's eyes.

"Oh, he'll only wish he had," she said before taking off once more. She felt a twinge of guilt for not saying more, not _learning_ more about the woman who had opened so many doors for her. There was a sense though, that it would not be the last time they saw each other. Content with that, she renewed her vigor in chasing down a certain green changeling.

Not noticing he had doubled back several feet beneath her.

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Review, por favor, per favore, onegaishimasu, and please in whatever language you frequent.


	2. See What's Inside

Beast Boy briefly looked back, seeing Raven streaking farther away in an attempt to catch him back at the Tower where she presumed he'd be. Looking back up at the looming cliff face, he beat his little wings to make the near completely vertical ascent to land on the grassy lookout she had just vacated. Sure enough, the young woman Raven had been conversing with was still there, her gaze resting gently on his landing form.

"Hello, Beast Boy," she greeted as he returned from his animal form, unfolding himself to stand up straight.

"Hey," he responded casually. He, much like Raven, wanted to be on guard around this strange woman, particularly after seeing the effect she seemed to have had on Raven. But there was something about her that wouldn't allow him to be anything but completely relaxed, even more so with his animal instincts. He had never seen her before tonight, yet there were urges in him that begged for him to transform into a dog and simply curl himself around her feet contentedly.

"How long had you been in the tree?" she asked suddenly, moving to sit and lay back on the grass. Despite the light pollution from the city behind them, there were still a fair number of stars sprinkling the night sky. His body moving of its own volition, he found himself mimicking her motions as he responded.

"'Bout the time you started talking about having a purpose," he answered honestly, unable to do anything but. For once, it was his _human_ instincts that were more on guard than his animal ones, though the inborn trust that side of him seemed to have in this woman completely overrode any human fears that voiced themselves. "I thought you knew I was there the whole time. You looked right at me."

"Only because your heart rate picked up when I suggested that Raven let the rest of the team help her. You simply confirmed my suspicions when you flipped out and rustled all the leaves." He turned his head from the sky and stared at her in awe.

"You heard my heart? I was a bird! And at least five feet above you!" She merely smiled without turning, as if sharing a private joke with the stars.

"These ears catch more than most people think. I'm more like you than _you _would think." Beast Boy turned skeptical, his face contorting, though she never turned to see it. "Tell me, how do your powers work when you are in your human form?"

"All of my senses are super-strong," he explained easily, a little unnerved and unsure of why he was so comfortable about speaking to her. "For a human, anyway. I still need to be in an animal form to get the full effect."

"Are you so sure that your powers are what give you those abilities?"

Beast propped himself up on his elbows, staring at her as if she had suddenly turned into a zombie from one of his beloved B-grade movies. "Where else would they have come from?"

"I'm assuming you can hear the squirrel family shifting around in their little tree-knot home, and the birds that just rustled in their nests to get more comfortable. You can hear the waves hitting the rocks below as clearly as if you were standing on the rocks themselves, and smell the salt from the ocean mixing with the grass we're lying on and the faint scent of the night blooms from the shrubs near the gorge." She smirked as his jaw-dropped, his ears coming perking upward a bit to a shocked point. "I can feel the utter shock pouring off of you, just as easily as you can feel the calm radiating off of me. All of these things, and I know for a fact that I don't have a drop of animal DNA in me."

"Ho-…how did you…you can…all that?" he stuttered in typical Beast Boy fashion. "Dude! You must be some kind of freaky psychic alien or something! There's no way any normal person could hear and smell all the stuff I can!" Her eyes suddenly closed slightly, and her face softened into a much sadder expression.

"I never said I was normal."

Beast Boy cringed, a soft sorrow in her voice shriveling up his excitement. His ears drooped as his whole body seemed to take on a posture of a chastised puppy without ever changing form.

"Uh…I…that was…I didn't mean…I mean you seem normal enough, you just aren't…wait! No, I meant you can't be normal but still look like…I mean…um…can we just start over?" he practically whimpered, letting his upper body fall to the ground once more.

"All I'm trying to say is that you are more human than you might think. You've become so used to being Beast Boy, that you might be ignoring another part of you. The you that came _before_ Beast Boy was born."

Silence settled as Beast Boy's eyes darted across the sky, mimicking the rapid fire thoughts bouncing around in his head. True, he never did reflect much on his past, almost a completely past life the way he looked at it now. Short of probably Cyborg, he was really the only Titan to have had something that could pass as a normal, human childhood…all up until the disease.

_What was I like back then? _he asked himself, actually finding it difficult to remember. But he tried; pushing past the loss of his parents, past the birth of his powers, past the green skin and the initial diagnosis. As if traveling through his mind, much like he had Raven's, he came face to face with the image of a cute little sandy-blond boy, staring up at him innocently.

Beast Boy blinked at him, realizing intellectually that he was looking at himself, but on some level not recognizing the kid in front of him. Suddenly, the child spoke.

"D'you wanna play with me?" he asked enthusiastically. Beast Boy looked around them. They seemed to be standing in a black void, just hanging in the middle of space. _What're we gonna do, play patty-cake?_

"Um…sure?" he answered uneasily. "Whaddya wanna play?" The boy sat down on the non-distinct ground and took up a very dignified pose.

"Let's tell a story! I'll start, and then you go, and then I go, and we keep going until one of us stops!" Beast Boy smiled at the energy his younger self exuded, the excitement written on his face. He sat along with the boy, moving himself a little bit closer. Soon they launched into a tale, one of the old folk-stories he'd learned in Africa. The two were gesturing and laughing, eyes glazed as if they were actually living the story as opposed to just telling it. Beast Boy felt a weight he didn't know was there fade away, a sort of natural peace coming to take its place.

"That's more like it," a gentle voice spoke, interrupting the dream he hadn't realized he'd lost himself in. He opened his eyes, wondering when they'd drifted shut, seeing the stars above him once more.

"Dude! What just happened? Did you just voodoo me asleep or something?" He propped himself up on his elbows again, noticing he could suddenly feel that same unnamed weight rest on him once more. His brow furrowed in response, a slight frown creeping onto his features.

"You calmed. You relaxed, you centered, I don't know what you want to name it, but you basically found _you_. You were…" she drifted off, trying to find the best way to voice the nature of what had happened. "Complete."

He almost instinctively denied it, almost argued that she wasn't making any sense, almost explained the whole thing away as a ludicrous plot to a cheesy horror flick. But something stopped him. He thought back to the…_dream_, experience, vision, whatever it was, and realized she was right. It wasn't necessarily clear how…but she was right.

"How…could you tell?" She shrugged.

"You can just feel it. Same as everything else." He nodded, understanding what she was trying to say, and realizing there was really no way to say it. It was just something you got, or you didn't. "How you did it, only you know," she added. He laid there quietly, trying to sort out the jumble his mind was in again, desperately searching for that feeling he'd discovered for so brief a time. His lack of success, however, began to show in the frustration that slowly tensed up his body.

"I don't get it…why won't it come back?" She didn't respond, which only served to frustrate him more. "I don't know what I did! I just…didn't do anything! All I did was tell a stupid old story, and it felt like…like everything was going to be okay!" he said angrily, though not with any great volume.

"Why isn't everything going to be okay now?" she probed.

"Because…because….well, just because!" He was sitting up completely now, indian style with his elbows on his knees as he squeezed his head in his hands. "Everything _obviously_ didn't turn out okay then, so why should it now?"

"But you weren't thinking about what could go wrong, then. Why do you now?"

"I'm a Titan! My whole job is to fix things when they go wrong, how am I supposed to do that if I'm not ready for something to go wrong?"

"So the five of you are on constant alert, twenty-four-seven, ready to fly out the door and save the city at the drop of a hat?"

"Well…no…that's Robin's job."

"Then if nothing's going wrong, why can't you just…relax?" He drooped, as if all the tension had suddenly left his body. Turning his head, he found that the woman was looking at him for the first time the whole evening. He almost cried, lost in her eyes. Eyes that somehow seemed to understand everything he didn't know how to voice, that could see every flaw in him and not care, that could see every wound and ignore the scars they left. Eyes that saw every mistake he felt he had made and still looked at him with love.

"Because…I could make something go wrong," he whispered, broken. He turned his head, feeling unworthy of her gaze, even though he wanted nothing more than for that feeling of acceptance to never end.

"Beast Boy, we can't live in fear of screwing things up. We have to be ready to fix our mistakes, but trying to fix something that's not broken…well, you become so busy trying to find what's wrong that you can't really appreciate what's right." He lifted his head slightly, looking out across the ocean as he tried to digest what he was being told.

"I've known you for maybe an hour, and somehow you manage to turn my life upside down. How do you do it?" he asked, looking over at her again. She, however, had resumed her star-gazing, to his delight and slight disappointment, and simply shrugged.

"I just listen. Both to what's said and what's not said."

His typical response would have been to voice his confusion at such a cryptic statement, regardless of the fact it _kind _of made sense. He realized then that he was selling himself short…he understood her completely, but just wasn't confident that he did. _Is that what she meant? Trying to fix what isn't broke to begin with?_ A remnant of that peace he had felt settled on him again, and he felt his mouth slightly turn up into a genuine smile. Not a trademark, pearly-white Beast Boy goofy grin. Just a smile.

After a few more moments of reveling in his new discovery, he remembered his original purpose for turning back to talk to this woman. Opening his mouth to get her attention, he realized he had no clue what her name was in order _to_ call her and get her attention. _Well…that makes things awkward,_ he thought. _We can't have this deep conversation with me calling her "hey you" every time I want to ask a question._

"I believe you had a question you originally wanted to ask." Beast Boy's eyes widened a little. _Now __**that**__ was just creepy._

"How…how can I help Raven?" he asked quietly. "You told her to let us help her…but how do I do it without turning her away?" He looked over to find her smiling. Not at him, but at the stars. He was somewhat glad for that; he wasn't entirely sure he wouldn't either melt into a puddle or break down crying if she turned that smile toward him.

"I think you're already well on your way to figuring that out. She needs help seeing who she really is before she can try to accept it. Who better to trust than someone who has already accepted himself, and therefore has nothing to hide?" He felt a little bit of pride well in him at that, but just as quickly deflated, his ears drooping ever so slightly.

"She'd probably much rather turn to the others than me, anyway." Out of the corner of his eye, he saw the woman shrug.

"Maybe. But that doesn't mean she won't need you. You will see things in her that only you see, that only you _can_ see. It might take time, it might not. Just remember, part of asking her to let you in will require letting her in, too." That, for some reason, struck him with fear. He suddenly wondered if that was what she felt every time he tried to pry.

"We may have more in common than we give ourselves credit for," he responded with uncharacteristic insight. The woman smiled again.

"That you may, my friend." After remaining a few more moments in silence, she suddenly sat up, managing to rock herself in a standing position. "It's getting late. You'd best be getting back to the Tower before they start to worry." Beast Boy stood as the woman turned to leave.

"Wait a sec!" he called out, causing the woman to stop, turning her head slightly. "Who are you? I know Raven doesn't know your name, but she enjoyed talking to you…and, well…I did, too. It'd be a lot easier to do this again if we knew how to find you." To his surprise, she simply laughed.

"If you want to find me, all you have to do is come here. I tend to come quite often, so chances are we'd run into each other if either of you showed up." With this she started to walk off once more.

"Can I at least give you a lift over that gorge?" This caused her to pause, not in response to being spoken to as before, but at the actual question. "I know it's not the safest, and even if you _are _as special as I think you are, I'd feel better if I knew you weren't taking such a big risk," he explained, not really thinking twice about what he was saying. She didn't turn, but something in her body language suddenly became…_coy_.

"Why Beast Boy, if I didn't know better, I'd say you were flirting with me." He blinked in shock, replaying what he'd said in his head. Part of him reared up to fire off some kind of joke or play of words to cover his mistake. For once, he ignored that part.

"I…was just saying what I thought. I mean, I know you can probably take care of yourself…but I'd still like to help. You know, to kind of…pay you back, I guess, in a way," he finished bashfully, scratching the back of his head. She turned with a slight smile on her lips; he _did_ nearly melt into a puddle.

"Like I said, if I didn't know better, I'd think it. But thank you, anyway. I guess…" she trailed as her eyes lost focus, locking onto something only she could see. "I guess tonight I'll play it safe. Shall we?" He smiled back at her, and they walked the rest of the way to the gorge. Turning into a pterodactyl, he gently grabbed onto her arms and lifted her over to the other side. Once she was safely on the ground, he landed once more and resumed his normal shape.

"Can I ask you one last question before we split?"

"Sure," she said as she made a motion of brushing her arms off, as if attempting to straighten sleeves that weren't actually there.

"How can you know so much about being whole, but not seem whole yourself?" She stopped suddenly, but only briefly, a motion caught by Beast Boy only because he was paying very close attention.

"Who's to say I'm not whole?" she countered.

"I am," he answered gently, confidently. "It's like you said…you can just feel it." She simply stood in silence a while longer, no longer moving in any fashion. After a few moments, she finally spoke.

"There is knowledge, and there is experience. People know that oxygen exists without ever seeing it, and people feel the affects of love with ever knowing they've fallen for someone."

"But you…you seem like you've…_been_ there," he said, slightly unsure of himself. She sighed, and the sound brought an unexpected pain to his heart.

"There is also a fuller knowledge that comes from knowing _and _experiencing. That knowledge never goes away, even if the experience does." She turned, then, and started to walk away. "It's getting late, Beast Boy. We'd best be getting to our homes."

"But-"

"Don't worry. I'll be fine. And I'm sure we'll meet again," she called out, walking closer and closer to the city. Beast Boy couldn't shake the sadness that had fallen on him in that brief moment, that somewhat unexpected moment where it felt like she'd revealed a very deep, hurting part of herself to him. But he knew she was right; while it was by no means late enough for the others to worry, he had been out long enough for them to probably start to wonder. Especially if Raven had returned looking for him.

He turned toward the bay and after briefly looking back toward the area the enigma of a woman he had encountered had walked off in, he changed into an owl, taking off toward home.

--

Reviews, reflections, reactions, thoughts, and constructive criticism much appreciated.


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